Frightliner Read online

  "Which," Director Dave concluded, "was the genius behind this week's challenge?"

  "Challenge? Try fiasco! Eidelberg died!"

  Dave shrugged. "Well, sure. You cut off his head."

  Wang passed Gary another bag.

  Neeta spoke quietly. "Dave, do you really want what would have happened to Bergie if I hadn't?"

  The room got very quiet.

  When Dave spoke, he, too, used a hushed voice. "Neeta, this is a dangerous business. You told us that yourself, right? The turnover rate is, sixty-five percent a year, right?"

  She glared at him.

  "You've lost two partners already. That's part of why you came to us--to find a new partner, right?"

  "I didn't come to you," she growled.

  He held up placating hands. "I misspoke, but that is the beauty of this partnership, right? Think about it: You've trained twelve people, and only one has died!"

  "Half-trained. They're too raw--"

  "Yet only one has died! Even better!"

  "Tell that to Heisman."

  "Come on. They're growing him a new foot."

  "And Goldie?"

  "Responding well to medication--isn't that right, Sharon, baby?" He turned to his personal assistant.

  Sharon, whose blank smile and unfocused gaze implied that she was on some serious drugs herself, nodded.

  Dave made a "see there?" gesture with one hand. "Alexis walked after the first training video. Just imagine if she'd actually signed up with an exterminator before she'd learned it wasn't for her. As for Hu--well, the whole incident with the toilets was unfortunate, but no harm done, right?"

  "Plus, it'll look great on your blooper reel, right?" Neeta said, grinning with all her teeth.

  "Right! Now you're--oh, Neeta! Neeta, Neeta, Neeta." Dave shook his head and tsked. "Is that what you think this is to us? Just good TV?"

  He clasped his hands together as if in prayer and pressed them to his lips. When he again spoke, he pointed his fingers toward her. "Neeta, I've seen entire neighborhoods ravaged by out-of-control undead. Stood by helplessly as people burned their homes to the ground rather than risk contagion. It's heartbreaking, you know it is. I don't need to tell you, but Joe Public doesn't get that. Zombies are just another filthy pest that only happen to other people. Keeping us safe? Just another dirty job no one wants to know about.

  "Neeta, baby, you're their wake up call. The zombies are real, and they are now! They could strike anywhere--from the mattress factory in the industrial district to the Pilates studio uptown. Zombie exterminators--people like you. Like your mother, God rest her soul--your people, Neeta, are all that stands between us and certain annihilation."

  Suddenly, he spun around so that his prayer hands pointed at Bergie's terrified face. "And if this! Yes, this! If this is what it takes to wake up the sleeping masses to the problem of our very survival, then I say God bless Bergie! God bless him!"

  Sharon let out a loud wail and spilled out of her chair, grabbing Dave by the knees and sobbing. Producer Alberts regarded him with a proud, watery smile. Gary and Wang wept openly, as did some of the support crew sitting in the back, and even Lawyer Larry sniffled. Ted turned away, but whether to laugh or cry wasn't clear.

  Neeta pinched the bridge of her nose and let out a growly sigh.

  "I won't have another stupid death," she said. "There are better ways to wake Joe Public."

  "Of course," Dave said, scraping Sharon off his artificial-leather jeans and sitting at the table, leaning forward to show his earnest. "Low budget uniforms. Bad idea. Never happen again, right Wang?"

  "Never!" Wang sobbed.

  Neeta removed her hands from her face and steepled them in front of her. "It wasn't just the uniforms. You pitted us against eight zombies."

  "There were eight of you--"

  "I told you up front that one zombie is worth three trainees."

  "But Neeta, babe, you alone are a match for five zombies!"

  "Not when I'm babysitting plebes, gaffers and cocky cameramen. One of your own almost bought it."

  "I saw that! 'Come with me if you want to live!' I got chills! Didn't you get chills?" Dave looked around the room, gathering nods.

  "Old school," Wang said.

  "Classic!" added Alberts.

  Neeta slammed her hand on the table, making everyone jump. "No more! From now on, I choose the number you pit those plebes against. I will not be overruled on matters of safety. Your cameramen will train with the crew--those that can take it can film. If they can't, you'll remote the rest of us and make do with what you get."

  "Whatever you say, Neeta. We can work with that. Give the whole show a gritty realism. I'm seeing it! I am!"

  "There's nothing more dangerous than a defeated plebe," Neeta pressed. "It's one thing to be aware that you might become the zombie blue pate special; it's another when you've seen someone else's pate become the special. The next challenge has got to build them up. I will decide what it is and how they prepare. In the meantime, if any of them want to walk, you'll let them--and pay them a nice bonus besides."

  At this, the simpering stopped. "Er, how much--"

  "Twenty thousand. Each."

  "That's a thousand dollars a minute air time"

  "Plus whatever therapy they need to get past the nightmares."

  "Be reasonable--"

  "Reasonable?" Neeta had moved past yelling. People around her backed up against their seats. "How about you put on a homemade suit and come with me on a run? Then you can tell me what's 'reasonable.'"

  Dave opened and closed his mouth a few times. Finally, Alberts, with a look back at the image of Eidelberg, held up a hand.

  "Deal--but ten thousand comes from your pay."

  "Five."

  His mouth twisted into a frown. "Five."

  "Well!" Dave said, clapping his hands together and beaming at his team like a schoolteacher proud of his class. "We've accomplished a lot! But now we need to turn our minds to closure. We have lost a dear and popular member of our cast today. I know our trainees are going to need to mourn, to express their feelings, to understand just what meaning this could possibly have. They need you, Neeta, to lead them through this troubled time. You must speak with them. Tonight.

  "And I know the perfect location to film it!"

  ~ * ~

  Much as Neeta hated to admit it, Dave had been right about the place. Eidelberg would have loved the twilight memorial on the beach.

  The location crew found a nice little spot above the tide line, not far from a scrubby overhang. Dave sent people ahead to rake and clear the area of trash, animal debris and dead seaweed, and to move the federally mandated signs warning of the many dangers of swimming in the ocean (including cramps, chills, stings of naturally occurring wildlife that are really quite shy but have every right to defend themselves, shark attacks, porpoise buttings, and the completely understandable but nonetheless unsanitary bathroom habits of the ecologically rightful inhabitants). The four-by-four signs took two people each to move, but Dave insisted that their reflective surfaces would interfere with the lighting.

  Just outside the ring of logs, they'd set up a shrine to Donald "Bergie" Eidelberg: his favorite surfboard rose from the ground like a California tombstone. The production crew had enlarged a photo of him from the first episode and framed it with leis, which they hung on the board. They'd spread one of his beach towels in front it, and everyone had set some item on it that reminded them of him: A canister of Sex Wax; ironic, considering that he claimed celibacy was absolutely necessary for champion surfing. The sunglasses Neeta had refused to let him wear into the warehouse, not that it had helped. The surfing trophy he’d kept by his nightstand--second place. The painting he'd been working since the beginning of the show; they thought it might be a wave. The keys to his classic 1978 AMC Pacer; he'd bragged that once he won the million, he was going to give it the overhaul it deserved. Lawyer Larry, whose real name was Eugene, had already put it up for auction on eBay, with the
proceeds to go to the Retired Surfers Association, in accordance with Bergie's will.

  Neeta and her plebes had trooped to the site, accompanied by the filming crew, just as the sun hesitated over the horizon, like a swimmer preparing to enter a cold pool. As the sun dipped, then sank into the horizon, they ate hot dogs, drank sodas and shared stories about their fallen teammate. Roscoe waxed poetic about his legs; Katie admitted to a secret crush. Gordon laughed how Bergie was going to teach him surfing when this was all over in exchange for learning how to dum-dum bullets. LaCenta rolled her eyes and declared him a damfool, but her eyes misted when she said it. Spud, silent and thoughtful, said he'd go visit Bergie's mom with Neeta before heading back to Idaho, and Nasir offered to join them.

  Within the circle of logs, the campfire roared merrily, bathing Neeta and her plebes in its warm light. Soon, they'd each light a candle from that fire and hold it close as they discussed the day's tragedy. Dave was having paroxysms of joy over the effect. Neeta wondered if he'd gotten permits, planned to pay the fines, or had bribed someone to arrange this cozy beach scene. Since the California Carbon Footprint Reduction Act, such "eco-destructive luxuries" like campfires had been banned.

  From her log apart from the others, LaCenta was complaining. "All I'm saying is that my family lost everything in that fire and then the judge fined us for starting it, but oh, let the Hollywood man want 'authenticity,' and they turn a blind eye."

  Roscoe sighed heavily. Perched on the log with his feet flat on the sand, knees together, wrists resting on knees, wearing a tailored white t-shirt and matching boat shorts, he looked like an out-of-pace model. He insisted white was the Chinese color of death and symbolized purity and nobility of the spirit, but Neeta suspected he just wanted to stand out in the dim light.

  "Give it a rest, Placenta," he sneered.

  "It's LaCenta, and if you can't come up with a more imaginative insult, Roscoe, you should just shut your hole."

  "Which one, honey?"

  "Stop it!" Katie shrieked. "We're supposed to be saying goodbye to Bergie!" She buried her head into Spud's shoulder and sobbed.

  He patiently reached into her backpack and handed her a tissue from the boxes she'd brought with her. They'd started the fire using the dirty ones as kindling.

  Good ol' Spud. Calm, dependable, and about as exciting as potatoes. He could be good at this job, Neeta thought. Yet every week, Dave complained about his low ratings on the online polls. "Sure, people love potatoes!" he'd ranted at one writing session, "but who really thinks about them?"

  Gary spoke up. "They like them with something. Cheeseburger and fries."

  "Steak and potatoes," Wang added.

  Dave grinned that maniacal grin. "Potato and gun! Yes! Yes! I'm seeing it! So what do we hook him up with? Who is our 'steak'?"

  The next day, Neeta had walked by LaCenta's trailer just in time to see Wang go flying headfirst out the door.

  "I may have been raised in the hood, but I ain't no Hollywood whore!" she shouted.

  Neeta had rounded up Gordon, and the two of them had a found Dave for a sandwich and a talk. Rather, Neeta talked while Gordon held Dave sandwiched between himself and the wall. Afterward, Spud found himself teamed with Gordon as a weapons master apprentice, none the wiser of the behind-the-scenes dealing. Dave had had to settle for potato gun.

  Now, thanks to Bergie's death, it seemed Dave might get his steak and potatoes, too.

  She was really growing to loathe Dave.

  She glanced across the fire at Gordon, who looked up from sharpening his hunting knife to roll his eyes. Behind him, just inside the dim light of the fire, Nasir was finishing his prayers. He'd spread his little prayer rug on the sand near the memorial, facing Mecca and Medina, and was moving through the motions of standing, kneeling and pressing his head against the ground, murmuring the prayers in his native tongue. One of the cameramen moved in for a butt shot, but Gordon had leaned back and waved his knife at him threateningly, and he'd backed off. Some things ought to stay sacred.

  Unaware of the commotion around him, Nasir finished and settled on the log beside Gordon, the prayer rug rolled up beside him. Neeta picked up the candles and passed them around. Each took one and leaned toward the fire to light it. Spud lit Katie's from his.

  Neeta gazed into her candle, gathering her thoughts. She was tired. She'd spent the afternoon combing the warehouse with another exterminator, a colleague from Anaheim, to make sure there weren't any more surprises lurking in the shadows. Fortunately, Jason Hollerman was a big Dave Lor fan; he'd done the job for a chance to meet his idol and the promise of getting a part in a future episode. As they'd scoured the warehouse with flamethrowers and cleaning products, she'd mulled over what had happened, what she would say about it and most of all, how she was going to salvage the disaster.

  "Don't think of it as a disaster, Neeta," Hollerman said. He swung about suddenly, flames spewing, then laughed as he realized he'd charcoaled a rat. "A hard lesson, sure, but nothing like the ones your mom and I had to learn back in the day. Six of your trainees survived, and together, you kept four more civilians safe. Your mom and I didn't see successes like that until probably our second or third year."

  "It was different then, and it should have been different now. This should have been a controlled situation." She held up a hand. He moved in to cover her while she checked out some zombie spoor: dried skin, a rotting finger, what looked like part of a nose. Must have been some sneeze. Still, it looked old, from before the episode. She scraped it into a hazardous waste bag, then wiped the area clean.

  "Nothing's 'controlled' where the walking undead are concerned. If you believe that, then you've forgotten what your mother taught you, Little Girl."

  Looking at the faces around the campfire, she resolved never to forget again, and to make sure these people never forgot, either. Still, she had to make sure they knew they could win this fight, too.

  "Today should not have happened," she started.

  Immediately, Roscoe jumped in. "Oh, gawd, Neeta. No one's blaming you--"

  "Shut up!" LaCenta snarled. "This is not the time for your kissing up."

  "Oh, so you're blaming Neeta, are you? Maybe you'd better look in the mirror if you want to assign blame. Did you even bother to shoot that flamethrower where she told you to?"

  "How was I going to do that when all I could hear was Caterwauling Kate?"

  "Stop it!" Katie squealed. "There's plenty of blame to go around."

  Gordon snorted.

  Neeta cleared her throat, and they fell silent.

  "Katie's right. This whole thing was a rats' nest of mistakes. Our intel was bad, and we went up against twice as many zombies as we'd expected. Eidelberg left the group. Whether he thought he'd impress someone or he got hit with the Exterminator's Berserk, we'll never know. Our civilians panicked first, got in the way. When Bergie fell, no one doused him. Where were you, right wing?"

  Nasir studied his candle, but Gordon just snorted. "Come on, Neeta. Splash him with toilet bowl cleaner? Who really believes--"

  "The exterminators whose lives have been saved by a couple of gallons of commercial grade Porcelain Sparkle, that's who. You have to believe in your tools, or they will fail you because you fail to use them well. Undiluted household cleaner repels zombies. It's not faith; it's fact."

  "It doesn't make sense," Nasir muttered. "There's no reason that should work."

  "--that we know of, Nasir. There's no reason we know of that thousands of dead are clawing their way out of their graves and seeking out the living to gnaw on, either. Yet they do. That, too, is fact."

  She looked past them at the shrine they'd made to Bergie, which some production crewman had lit with candles while they were talking. Everyone turned to follow her gaze. Katie sniffled.

  Neeta started again, "Today, you learned another fact of this job. People die. Good people, people who--" She stopped mid-sentence, her mind suddenly playing its own episodic flash backs of people she'd seen die
: Bergie, and Michael, Threadgill with the red hair and thick Scottish accent, timid Lois, Auburn and Peaceglove...

  Thinking like that could make a person mad from grief. She forced her mind to the present. "--People who chose this job, not for fame or glory or promise of a million dollars. It's because they saw people die, and come back, and kill. Or because they saw soulless bodies denied their eternal rest. Or, like my mother, like me, they saw a threat to our world that we are uniquely qualified to fight against.

  "I'm twenty-six years old. My initiation into the 'biz was when a zombie broke out of a faulty containment unit and knocked my mother down from behind. I drove it back with a bottle of window cleaner in one hand while I doused my mother in shower scrub with the other. We lived because I responded the way my mother trained me.

  "Nonetheless, odds are I'll die before I'm 40 from a job-related incident. When I do, I want to be buried holding my severed head in my hands. I will not come back.

  "The good news is, we know more about zombie behaviors now than we did when my mother exterminated them. Every advancement in knowledge, properly applied, translates into another week, another year our people survive. However, zombie extermination is not a science. We could have done everything right today, and Bergie could still have died."

  All eyes were on her now. She'd ordered Dave to keep the cameras out of everyone's field of vision, yet she could feel the lenses focusing in on her face. She ignored it. Dave had been right about one thing: these plebes needed her if they were going to get through this with their lives and sanity intact. The world needed them.

  "Each of you has chosen this career, and not just for the money or whatever glamour you think you'll find. Each of you can do this. I wouldn't have selected you, otherwise. However, this is not a game.

  "I promise you: you have just faced the toughest challenge of this show. I guarantee this: you have not faced the toughest challenge of your career. Just because this was the toughest challenge, doesn't mean someone won't get hurt. Won't get killed."

  She paused. She figured they'd think she was giving them time for her words to sink in, but really, she was trying to remember how she'd phrased her next statement. By contract, she couldn't mention Dave or the network or anything else that blew the illusion of reality. If she did, they'd have to re-shoot, and she knew darn well Dave would take that opportunity to exert his influence. She set her candle down and leaned toward the firelight. From her pocket, she withdrew six envelopes.